Anime Ys series

[4249]

Other Ys games tend to have a somewhat similar but not quite Zelda-like overworld, like Oath in Felghana, Naphistim Seven and Celceta. Not a straight line but not open ended either.

The bump system Ys games (1+2) and the Naphistim engine ones (Naphistim itself, Origin and Felghana) have simplistic equipment and progression systems but Ys Seven and Memories of Celceta have craftable equipment and various skills you can equip on Adol and his companions.

Hmmh, guess Felghana is my next stop then. Although I guess I was secretly hoping for an Ys Souls or something.

 

[Valestein]

Felghana is arguably the best Ys ever made. The boss fights are pretty challenging and hella fun.

 

[Machocruz]

Ys Oath boss battles are super intense. You have to stay on point the whole time, no slacking, like an arcade shooter. One of my favorite ARPGs. I played it back when it was still Japan only, and it took some effort to get into; the iso was not so easy to find back then and the translation patch wasn't out yet. But I got dat magic eye.. Once I "discover" something, it seems to grow in visibility and popularity. I guess it would have come to the west eventually, like the old games.

I find the backgrounds and character in it and Origins to be superior to Ys Seven and MoC.

 

[Jack Dandy]

Seconding Seboist and Machocruz.
Playing OiF on Inferno, it was absolutely insane.
In the Chester battles, about halfway thru them, he'd go bugfuck berserk and start teleporting all over the arena.
You simply couldn't even have the luxury of looking at his HP bar to see how well you're doing. You had to have 100% focus, both visual (see where he's at, which way attacks will come from) and audiowise. (Lots of his attacks had unique sounds before launching which would help you do the correct reaction).

At the end of the final boss battle, I felt like my heart was going to burst outta my chest.

It pains me that we'll probably never see Falcom making a game like that again.
I really should try and get the 2hu clones running on my machine...


Also- forgot to mention , but Napishtim has the best atmosphere and "Adventure!" feeling out of all the games. It might be a bit worse than OiF\Origins when it comes to mechanics, but all the other stuff propel it up to Oath's level imo

 

[Valestein]

Biggest issue I had with Napishtim is the backtracking just for the sake of backtracking(every now and then you had to wall the way back to some central dungeon for whatever story reason). Hopefully Xseed can implement save point teleporting in it's steam release.

 

[Jack Dandy]

Ugh! I hope not. I dunno why some people have that much trouble with backtracking. It makes the gameworld feel like, well, a WORLD instead of a game.

 

[Machocruz]

Have any of you guys seen the game Tree of Savior? It's an Asian MMO that has something to do with Ragnarok Online, but the music and aesthetic makes me think "Ys."

WEABOO ALERT!

Something about these Japanese/Asian takes on European fantasy I find quite charming and dream-like, when they aren't going over the top with the visual designs. It's like they take a western storybook aesthetic and roll it into 80s/90s anime aesthetic, apply a mixture of symphonic and rock tones, and voila. There also seems to be a lot of reverence for the natural world, spirituality, pastoral living, artifacts of everyday life, that doesn't exist in American made games. Euro games have it too to an extant.

 

[4249]

Fucking hell playing Hugo is making my fingers hurt. Constant goddamn button mashing. Seeing as his attacks don't have any kind of a sequence like Yunicas and Toals, why can't you just keep the button down for him to attack. Goddamnit.

 

[Valestein]

Ugh! I hope not. I dunno why some people have that much trouble with backtracking. It makes the gameworld feel like, well, a WORLD instead of a game.

The problem isn't with backtracking per say if it's done right, like with new enemies popping up or new paths opening up in previously explored areas but in this case, it's just backtracking for the sake of padding out game time.

Fucking hell playing Hugo is making my fingers hurt. Constant goddamn button mashing. Seeing as his attacks don't have any kind of a sequence like Yunicas and Toals, why can't you just keep the button down for him to attack. Goddamnit.

Yeah, shame we can hold attack and move around at the same time.

In other news, I learnt today that Ys Chronicles and Oath in Felghana were given Steam card support(previously only Origins had it).

 

[Cowboy Moment]

I've been playing Ys Origin on and off for a while, and have mixed feelings about it. On one hand, I can appreciate the core mechanics and enemy/boss design. On the other, I just can't find a way to control the game comfortably while playing as Hugo. I have a lot of trouble consistently positioning myself across diagonals with a d-pad, and an analog stick makes it difficult to make small adjustments and is generally a bit awkward because the game doesn't actually have analog movement. Haven't tried a keyboard yet, seems like it should be inferior to both alternatives.

On the other hand, I kinda have similar problems in shmups, so maybe I just need to learn to use a d-pad properly.

 

[80Maxwell08]

I started the series with the PSP port of YS6 too. God what an awful port. Imagine playing an old zelda game but every time you change rooms you add in the load times from Duke Nukem Forever. Holy crap it's amazing I could stand playing that game as long as I did with that problem.

 

[Valestein]

That makes me grateful for having played the PS2 version instead.

 

[Jack Dandy]

The PSP port of Napishtim was actually my first Ys game!
The fact I still managed to enjoy it shows just how nice that game is.

 

[StaticSpine]

Completed Ys I, the final boss battle was... intense.

 

[Valestein]

Completed Ys I, the final boss battle was... intense.

He's certainly the one Ys boss I've died the most to...

 

[StaticSpine]

He's certainly the one Ys boss I've died the most to...

Actually it was far from fun More like a mixture of steady hands and lots of luck.

 

[Valestein]

Yeah, that fight is pretty broken. Thankfully, the final boss in YS II is much better designed and is a shining example of the badass boss fights the series is known for.

 

[StaticSpine]

Yeah, that fight is pretty broken. Thankfully, the final boss in YS II is much better designed and is a shining example of the badass boss fights the series is known for.

Started Ys II already.

And also bought Memories of Celceta for Vita and Oath on Steam.

 

[Valestein]

Started Ys II already.

And also bought Memories of Celceta for Vita and Oath on Steam.

Good man, there's also Ys Seven (psp game) that you can get off the PS store for Vita. It's notable for being my first Ys game and what made me fall in love with the franchise.

 

[DwarvenFood]

Playing Ys 1, but it feels -quite the grind- , I'm fighting these enemies that I can one-hit being level 3, but all the next areas (mine, temple) have enemies that one-hit me.. so only way is a long long grind for xp and gold.. or maybe I'm missing something obvious.. well I'm not giving up just yet, considering part I is regarded as essential.

 

[Valestein]

Playing Ys 1, but it feels -quite the grind- , I'm fighting these enemies that I can one-hit being level 3, but all the next areas (mine, temple) have enemies that one-hit me.. so only way is a long long grind for xp and gold.. or maybe I'm missing something obvious.. well I'm not giving up just yet, considering part I is regarded as essential.

IIRC, it doesn't take all that much killing to be at an adequate level(xp scales to the level). Maybe, you haven't bought or upgraded armor?

 

[Abu Antar]

I have been playing Memories of Celceta on and off. Not having any platforming makes this less fun than the ones that have it. I also feel like the boss fights haven't been very memorable. All characters feel different enough to control, so I'll give them that. Music is also solid, like most Falcom games. I just cleared the tower where Eideel (or whatshisname) should have been and it had the best boss fight so far, I guess.

 

[Valestein]

The boss fights in Celceta are disappointingly easy(even though they're fun), which is made worse by the fact that you can craft 99 of each health item(Seven only had a limited supply) and even then, i beat most bosses without having to use one. This was on normal, maybe for my second run I'll play on hard...

 

[StaticSpine]

Playing Ys 1, but it feels -quite the grind- , I'm fighting these enemies that I can one-hit being level 3, but all the next areas (mine, temple) have enemies that one-hit me.. so only way is a long long grind for xp and gold.. or maybe I'm missing something obvious.. well I'm not giving up just yet, considering part I is regarded as essential.

The game is pretty short, something around 6 hrs to complete.

Btw you reach level cap somewhere in the middle, and I have no idea why it was made this way.

 

[Shadenuat]

There's also this in Ys I, where Adol can grope a goddess in a dark corner of a dungeon for her measurements(and there's a chievo for it on steam, Lol!).

cha ching

grinding

Nothing good old Art Money can't solve

Going through Ys 1 now. Boy the production values are great. That music & colorful sprites.
It also has a journal
a JRPG
with some sort of a journal of NPCs you've met
and option to pick some topics in dialogue to learn what you have to do

Combat and grinding are simple and awful at the same time though. But game is very charming.